Homs-based al-Nusra Front to Protect the Levant claimed responsibility for bombings in Syria over the weekend. Three suicide bombings in Damascus killed 27 people on Saturday and an explosion went off near a Syrian government security building in the northern city of Aleppo on Sunday.

In February, U.S. intelligence boss James Clapper said earlier attacks “had all the earmarks of an al-Qaeda-like attack” and added that “we believe al-Qaeda in Iraq is extending its reach into Syria.” Ayman al-Zawahiri, the titular leader of al-Qaeda following the unsubstantiated hit on Osama bin Laden in May of 2011, has announced his support for al-Nusra Front to Protect the Levant.

On February 26, according to the SITE Intelligence Group, al-Nusra Front to Protect the Levant posted a video on the al-Qaeda linked Shumukh al-Islam forum. The video includes a martyrdom statement by suicide bomber Abu al-Bara’a al- Shami. The al-Nusra Front to Protect the Levant announced the creation of the “Free Ones of the Levant Brigades” in a YouTube video posted on January 23. The group claimed an attack on security headquarters in Idlib in the statement.

The intelligence asset al-Qaeda played a crucial role in the overthrow and murder of Muammar Gaddafi in Libya. It is well known across the Middle East that al-Qaeda works for U.S. and British intelligence, although this historical fact is rarely if ever reported by the corporate media.